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Japan-Update

For Uniqlo's Yanai, Victoria's Secret was a real eye-opener

Japan's retail giant reveals his business philosophy and youthful lessons

Fast Retailing chief Tadashi Yanai speaks to The Nikkei at the company's headquarters in Ariake, Tokyo. (Photo by Rie Ishii)

TOKYO -- Back in the early 1970s, Tadashi Yanai headed back to the old coal mining town of Ube, southwest of Hiroshima, to take a job managing his family's tailor shop.

Then in his mid-20s, the hard-charging Yanai very quickly made the store a place employees did not want to work. "Six of the seven employees quit," Yanai admitted during a wide-ranging interview with The Nikkei. "Until then, I had thought business management was not for me."

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